Help on first C:S Asset?

[icantthinkofaname 56]

I'm wanting to make my first Cities Skylines asset (a building near where I live), but besides making a very basic sketchup model idk what to do. All I have is the building itself, no windows or anything. So its safe to say I need help with this. How do I add the windows and stuff, and how will I be able to texture it? Any help would be gr8

[Miccrosshill 367]

you should rename the to pic to "teach me working with sketchup".

 

As you are beginning with 3d modelling - i suggest to switch to blender (its free) because its first choice to model for CS and you will find tons of tutorials how to model.

 

Blender is easy to learn and sketchup isnt the right software to model for CS.

[Darf 1,439]

24 minutes ago, Miccrosshill said:

you should rename the to pic to "teach me working with sketchup".

 

As you are beginning with 3d modelling - i suggest to switch to blender (its free) because its first choice to model for CS and you will find tons of tutorials how to model.

 

Blender is easy to learn and sketchup isnt the right software to model for CS.

Not really, Sketchup has much better poly edit than blender or 3ds, it's just your preference. IMO blender and 3ds have terribly clogged interfaces, but they are better for UWV mapping and texturing. I suggest looking up a tutorial for your program of choice  to start off with. All you have now are 2 boxes on top of eachother. Here's a 3 min example of how you can low poly a building like that.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BzXrSjvvI94BeG80eE16MzgtcVk

[Miccrosshill 367]

ups .. i didnt knew that - most people i asked said to me that blender is the the app to choose - so sorry for the wrong answer

[Avanya 2,605]

It's really a preference thing. The "danger" of SketchUp is not everyone that uses it knows the tricks to keep the tris low or don't bother cleaning up the model. Blender is still a good choice (or 3DS Max for those who have access to that).

[Exurbanite 103]

I would recommend you use blender over sketchup since there are more threads and tutorials on this site for it (including my own) and the process for texturing/UV mapping is far simpler...if you can cal uv mapping a "simple" thing. There are also many, many videos on youtube that can help you with texturing, I don't think sketchup has as much tutorial content. I understand the concern by @Darf that the interface is intimidating, especially to beginners, but I myself only began from scratch with blender not even 6 months ago, and I managed to become very comfortable with it within a few weeks of starting. Imo investing the time into learning  blender will pay off immensely. 

[kingleno 197]

On 7/29/2017 at 0:16 PM, Miccrosshill said:

you should rename the to pic to "teach me working with sketchup".

 

As you are beginning with 3d modelling - i suggest to switch to blender (its free) because its first choice to model for CS and you will find tons of tutorials how to model.

 

Blender is easy to learn and sketchup isnt the right software to model for CS.

I disagree. If you have the time and motivation to compare, contrast, and learn two different programs...then try both out and see what sticks. I had no problem finding tutorials directly related to using Sketchup to make assets for Cities Skylines. Sometimes too many tutorials can be overwhelming. Although I do use 3d Max as an intermediary, and after a year and a half of using it, it's still intimidating as hell to me, someone without 3d modeling experience. (It's kinda free if you have access to a .edu email). I guess it doesn't matter if you're starting from Zero, but starting with Sketchup and zero knowledge worked out okay for me I would guess. 

[Mr_Maison 2,426]

I use Sketchup all the time but I do the finishing work in Blender. Sketchup is a great modeler for beginners as well as professionals. The biggest issue I have with Sketchup is the lack of proper UV tools. You can find plugins but it's so much easier in Blender. So I would suggest if you are comfortable with modeling in Sketchup, Make your base model with it, export the model and UV map it in Blender or whatever else you have. Not saying it's impossible to UV in Sketchup, it's just harder. All of my earlier assets main models was done completely in Sketchup.....but not the LODs. Another thing to consider is that LODs require for the texture to be within the 0-1 map coordinates which is hard to keep in check inside of Sketchup. If your texture goes outside of 0-1 for the LOD, it will not look good. So what I do is Make the LOD mesh in Sketchup and export it for proper UV in Blender.

BTW, you do not have to know Blender inside-out just to UV map. Check the list in the sticky of this forum section (I placed a link below) to find a link to a Blender course and just go through the basic interface and skip to the UV mapping section. Don't forget to get the OBJ Exporter plugin for Sketchup if you're using the "make" version. Hope this helps.

Resource link

 

[icantthinkofaname 56]

On ‎7‎/‎31‎/‎2017 at 7:20 AM, kingleno said:

I disagree. If you have the time and motivation to compare, contrast, and learn two different programs...then try both out and see what sticks. I had no problem finding tutorials directly related to using Sketchup to make assets for Cities Skylines. Sometimes too many tutorials can be overwhelming. Although I do use 3d Max as an intermediary, and after a year and a half of using it, it's still intimidating as hell to me, someone without 3d modeling experience. (It's kinda free if you have access to a .edu email). I guess it doesn't matter if you're starting from Zero, but starting with Sketchup and zero knowledge worked out okay for me I would guess. 

I agree with you since I tried Blender before and I just couldn't understand it honestly. Sketchup has a much better interface imo but I should still probably attempt to use Blender some more. And seeing how easily you were able to do the Fire Station 31 asset, I think Sketchup would be a much easier beginning for me

[icantthinkofaname 56]

On ‎7‎/‎29‎/‎2017 at 8:32 PM, Exurbanite said:

I would recommend you use blender over sketchup since there are more threads and tutorials on this site for it (including my own) and the process for texturing/UV mapping is far simpler...if you can cal uv mapping a "simple" thing. There are also many, many videos on youtube that can help you with texturing, I don't think sketchup has as much tutorial content. I understand the concern by @Darf that the interface is intimidating, especially to beginners, but I myself only began from scratch with blender not even 6 months ago, and I managed to become very comfortable with it within a few weeks of starting. Imo investing the time into learning  blender will pay off immensely. 

Did you use any tutorials on Blender or did you just teach yourself how to use it?

[icantthinkofaname 56]

On ‎7‎/‎29‎/‎2017 at 4:16 PM, Avanya said:

It's really a preference thing. The "danger" of SketchUp is not everyone that uses it knows the tricks to keep the tris low or don't bother cleaning up the model. Blender is still a good choice (or 3DS Max for those who have access to that).

yeah that's something I wanna avoid, having the tris too high and whatever. Obviously its my first building asset, so I know theres gonna be stuff I can fix with it, including tris.